Musk backed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2016 and former President Joe Biden in 2020, but did work with Trump at times during his first term. He said in 2017 that simply attacking Trump would "achieve nothing," calling for "open channels of communication" with the president.

The world's most powerful man and its richest man are lobbing threats and insults on their rival social media platforms, sparked by disagreements over Trump's "big, beautiful bill."

A key political event that started the process that led to this week’s ugly public breakup between President Trump and Elon Musk took place just more than two months ago. Musk was the largest 2024 ele